


archives

by birdhymns



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Gen, tags to be edited as other drabbles added
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-08
Updated: 2017-10-14
Packaged: 2018-03-29 13:23:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3897925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/birdhymns/pseuds/birdhymns
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Where any drabbles will be stored.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Proverbs 23:24. The father of the righteous will greatly rejoice; he who fathers a wise son will be glad in him.

He holds the case at least once every day, watching the blue light flash. No need to worry about the batteries dying in the middle of the night, being piezoelectric.

  
But Harold can't help but check that everything is in order, in all the chaos their lives have become, and hold the case close.

  
He'll have to teach the Machine again.

  
But Harold considers how she never forgot. How she apologised.

  
How she loved silently, even when doubt coloured all his actions.

  
And he thinks that teaching her again might be a good experience for him.


	2. clockwork

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Or rather, the defiance of.

The man comes by with his dog, at most, once a week, just another passing by the small window that glass and steel form.

They’ve tried to figure out if there’s a pattern to it, but it’s proven futile. He comes by in the morning, in the afternoon, in the dead of the night when they’re closing up.

If there is a pattern, they murmur one time, it’s that there’s none to be found.

But there comes a time where he stops coming altogether. Weeks pass, then months, and he becomes another here-and-gone thought before the worries of bills and the workings of Wall Street.

When they finally see him again, it takes them a moment to recognise him. His dog is the giveaway, and his glasses. But the suitcase in hand, the man on his left scanning the street, and the lady on his right with a playful look to her eyes, serve to obscure him from immediate recognition.

And then, part of the unending, never ceasing flow of people, they are gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> How the view of someone who does not know, differs from one who does… Samaritan would recognise them easier, all together. If it could, I mean. But someone who does not know them as they are, well. It’s different, obviously. What we know determines what we see, but even that’s not the be all end all.
> 
> I enjoy looking from the view of an outsider.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just some family time.

“Traitor.” Shaw shoots a mutinous look across the picnic blanket.

Quite relaxed in Root’s lap, Bear only waves his tail and pants at her, happily unaffected by her ire. So she turns her glare on Root instead. “You bribed him.”

“Shaw, you know I couldn’t have possibly done that.” Root tips her head, smiles. Her fingers scratch welcome circles against Bear’s neck. “Bear’s not an official; he can’t be bribed. He picks his resting place by himself.”

“We’re in a court now, or what?” Shaw spares another second for disdain, before rifling through the bag beside her. Wax paper and parchment crinkles as she works a sandwich free from the weight of several handguns; she wastes no time in biting down. When she swallows, mouth relatively clear, she says, “Don’t think I didn’t see you feeding him takeout this morning.”

“C’mon Shaw, how could I ever resist—” Root turns Bear towards her, and Shaw finds them with twin“—a face like this? Who am I, to deny him the pleasure of stir-fried chicken? Especially when now, I have to leave him alone most nights?”

Shaw grumbles and takes a large bite of sandwich.

It’s with a fond sigh and Bear that Root shifts, coming to sit beside Shaw, knees knocking together before she properly settles. “I don’t suppose we could make it up to you tonight and soothe your wounded pride?”

“My pride is not wounded.”

Root just smiles, hair falling as she tilts her head. “So is that a yes…?”

“It’s a maybe,” is Shaw’s reply, and she takes another bite.

Her knee remains where it is, and Bear stretches across their laps with a content sigh.


	4. Chapter 4

The handful of mornings are hard before Shaw accepts that this her reality, and not some fabrication from her thoughts and Samaritan’s prompting. That string of tension is always taut, waiting for the reset, for the now to fly back to breaking free once again. Or perhaps it’d be something new, with the hideout exposed.

But Root lies beside, and Root traces over her skin, and the memory of Root with her gun before her face beats alone in her mind, ready to die if she did.

And that was something Samaritan did not, would not have replicated with Root—the Root of her mind and Samaritan’s prompting—as bait. Bait meant nothing if it couldn’t draw out its intended target. It was the one thing Samaritan couldn’t do because it would never reach its goal; Root’s death would have heralded Shaw’s own.

Shaw supposes it was appropriate, that the start of freedom from Samaritan’s conditioning came at the end of Root’s gun.

She doesn’t think on it much. Tries not to. Mulling leads to doubts, and they’re nothing but a distraction from the present work: staying alive, and working to wipe every speck of Samaritan’s data away. But until then she’ll take the tiny moments with her team, working in tandem with ease, being good.

The stakes are so much more in this fight against Orwell’s worst nightmare, but Shaw feels in control, mostly. She doesn’t know if anything will fully convince her. If anything can.

But until something decides—her, or Samaritan—she’ll be by Root.

**Author's Note:**

> People've probably said it better than me, but Harold, for all he doubted the Machine, never wanted her dead, as we saw. And when we lose someone, something, we tend to remember the good things lost. I hope that was communicated, anyway.


End file.
